FlyerTalk Forums - FAQ: The Complete Newbie Guide/FAQ to the Air Canada Aeroplan Mini-RTW

INTRO

This thread is meant as a guide to the Aeroplan "Mini-RTW" for the uninformed newbie flyer. This is a no judgment zone!! Newbies are welcome. In this thread, the usage of scary acronyms and complicated FlyerTalk insider-speak will be minimized. The goal is to leave you, the novice traveler, with a decent understanding of how to book a Mini-RTW on Air Canada.

Also, this is a work in progress as I am not a professional and am just collecting information that has already been posted by other esteemed members into one post. None of this is original content. Please provide feedback if you think something in this guide should be amended/added.

INFO & COMMON QUESTIONS

What is the "Mini-RTW"?
The Mini-RTW is a name given to a type of reward booking using Air Canada's Aeroplan miles. It is actually not a "round-the-world" ticket at all - it is a regular award redemption. Just as you would use 75K frequent flyer miles to go to Japan on another airline, you can use 75K to do so using Aeroplan miles. The difference is that Aeroplan allows you to "stopover" in multiple cities at no extra mileage cost, making it very attractive compared to other reward travel. It should be noted that this isn't really that much better than some other airlines. For example, Delta offers one stopover + open jaw, which is only one stopover worse than Aeroplan's deal. But many of the airlines only offer one stopover and no open jaw. So there is definitely value here.

In addition to your final destination (in which you can stay for days/weeks/months), you are allowed:

Two stopovers in other cities (stay for days/weeks/months). You are allowed to trade one of these stopovers for an open jaw (where you land in one city, but take the next flight out of another city)
10 segments (layovers during which you spend less than 24 hours in a given city)

So, disregarding the additional 10 segments, an award trip for Japan could actually look like this:

NYC > Tokyo (destination - one week) > Paris (stopover - one week) > London (stopover - one week) > NYC

You basically get three times the world exploration for the price of one. If you add on the extra layovers allowed, you can turn it into:

NYC > Los Angeles (one day) > Hawaii (one day) > Tokyo (one week) > Seoul (one day) > Hong Kong (one day) > Paris (one week) > Munich (one day) > London (one week) > Washington DC (one day) > NYC

Of course, you don't have to do the above. Spending so much time in airports can be exhausting. But the option is there for you if you want it.

How many miles is this going to cost me?
See the Award Travel chart here: http://www2.aeroplan.com/use_your_mi...p=staralliance

From North America to "Asia 1" countries:

75K in Economy
125K in Business
175K in First

From North America to "Europe 1" countries:

60K in Economy
90K in Business
125K in First

...and so on. Check the link for other combinations. Assuming you are stopping in three cities, the city in the most "expensive" redemption zone is the zone you will have to pay for. So if you are visiting two Asia1 zone cities and one Middle East city, you will pay 80K miles rather than 75K miles since that is what the Middle East trip costs (numbers assume Economy class travel).

There is a potential loophole to this (that some members have been able to get to work). I will quote our fellow FTer echino (reformatted for spacing purposes):

Quote:

Originally Posted by echino (Post 16765716)

Also, I believe there is a trick here. But don't tell anyone. If you go JFK-JED-SIN-JFK, you pay Middle East mileage. But if you go JFK-SIN-JED-JFK, you pay Asia 1 mileage. This is because you trip is divided into two parts - outbound and return. In the first case, it would be:

Outbound: JFK-JED-SIN
Return: SIN-JFK

JFK-JED is 135k in business, and JFK-SIN is 125k, you pay whatever is higher (135k). In the second case, it would be:

Outbound: JFK-SIN
Return: SIN-JED-JFK

SIN-JED is 115k, and SIN-JFK is 125k, you pay whatever is higher (125k). So you get the idea. ;)

Quote:

Originally Posted by echino (Post 16765795)

I think, on the outbound, the stop which is most expensive from the origin is the one charged. On the return, the stop which is most expensive from the point of turnaround is the one charged. I saw, a couple of times, people reporting booking stops (not just connections, but full stopovers) in India on the return from Asia 1 for Asia 1 mileage because of this logic. They are not going North America - India. They are in fact going Asia 1 - India.

Which miles do I need to use? Can I use miles from other Star Alliance airlines?
You need to use Aeroplan miles. You cannot use miles from other Star Alliance members, such as United, to book this mini-RTW. However, you can book flights for the mini-RTW on any airline that is in the alliance and has the desired award seating available. You technically do not have to fly any segments on Air Canada at all.

Well, that's no use. I don't have any Air Canada miles.
If you have Starwood points, they can be converted to Aeroplan miles at a 1:1 rate, with a 5,000 mile bonus for every 20,000 miles you transfer. So for an Asia1 RTW (75K miles), you would have to transfer 60K Starwood points (60K + 15K bonus). You can also transfer American Express Membership Rewards points at a 1:1 rate.

Partial list of conversion possibilities:

Starwood 1:1 with 5,000 bonus for every 20,000 transferred
Amex Membership Rewards 1:1
Intercontinental 5:1
Marriott 4:1
Hyatt 2.5:1, or 2:1 if done in blocks of 50,000
Hilton 10:1

So, what's the catch? What are the restrictions?
There is no catch. However, there are some restrictions on your itinerary. This is where things get a bit more complicated.

1) Your itinerary must be within 5% of the total "Maximum Permitted Mileage" (MPM) for the route from the origin to the destination. Even though you are stopping in three cities by using your two stopovers and a final destination, you can define the destination as the stop city furthest away from the origin. Although certain flyers have gotten away with telling an inattentive phone rep that their final destination / "turnaround city" is one of their layover cities to increase their MPM, this does not always work. Sticking with one of your three stop cities is a safe bet.

MPM exist so that you cannot repeatedly fly around the world 10 times on your 10 segments. There is a limit to how many miles you can fly on the reward ticket. MPM guidelines can be found by using the KVS tool or by using Expert Flyer. MPM is calculated between your origin and your destination, one-way. Just double that number to get to the total MPM for the trip. You are allowed to overshoot this number by 5%, as a general rule. If you can find a bookable itinerary online that has a mileage longer than the published MPM, you can cite that and increase your MPM. In KVS, navigate to the "Reference" tab, select "MPM" from the dropdown menu, and enter your city pair. MPM information is available under the Travel Information section of ExpertFlyer. It is available to all subscribers, Basic or Premium, and there is a 5-day free trial to ExpertFlyer.com that can be used.

To see if your itinerary fits your MPM limit, you can use the site here to see your total miles traveled: www.gcmap.com. Enter your airport codes separated by dashes to see the itinerary and get the total mileage (e.g. NYC - LHR - NYC). Example here.

One important piece of good news: Any connections that you do not explicitly schedule do not count against your miles. So if one of your legs is New York to Oslo, but there is no direct flight and there is a connection in Paris, you only count the miles between New York and Oslo. The fact that you have to take a detour to Paris does not count in the total miles used.

2) If you do elect to use an open jaw instead of one of your stopovers, you must schedule the open jaw so that it is in the same "IATA zone" as either the origin or the destination city. So if you are going from NY to Japan to Europe and back to NY, the open jaw cannot be scheduled in Europe, since it is neither the origin zone or the destination zone. The open jaw also cannot be a larger distance than any two legs you are actually flying. In case you are wondering, IATA zones are as follows:

IATA 1 - The Americas (incl. Caribbean, Hawaii)
IATA 2 - Europe as far as the Ural Mountain range, Middle East & Africa
IATA 3 - Oceania, SE Asia, Far East, Sub-Continent.

Remember that if you use your open jaw at the turnaround/destination point, you will only have one stopover to use left. So you would be able to do NYC > Singapore (destination, open jaw) // Tokyo (stop) > NYC. This has one destination, one open jaw (at turnaround point), and one stopover. However, you would not be able to do this: NYC > Madrid (stop) > Singapore (destination, open jaw) // Tokyo (stop) > NYC. Because your 2 stops + 1 open jaw would be more than the two allowed.

3) You cannot land in the same city twice in any one direction. This means that on my way from NY to, let's say, Cairo, I cannot do New York > London > Paris > London > Cairo on the way there, since I would be stopping in London twice in one direction. However, I can stop in London on the way to Cairo and then again on the way back from Cairo.

4) The actual trip needs to be "bookable". It needs to follow certain rules. I won't get into too many details, but anything completely nonsensical in terms of routing is generally not going to fly. For example, starting in Europe and trying to go through the US on route to Asia. But most routes will not fall into this category. Just something to keep in mind.

Do I have to go in the same direction for every leg of the flight?
No. As an example, you can cross the Atlantic twice or cross both the Atlantic and the Pacific once (more like a real RTW trip).

How do I book this?
Assuming you have already planned out your entire itinerary to the dot and have made sure your trip is in accordance with the above restrictions, call Aeroplan and speak with a representative. Alternatively, you can try to book online for free. However, this is not always possible with more complicated routings.

What will this cost me in real cash? How can I minimize fees?
It depends on the region you travel to and which airline you fly on. In general, the more Air Canada segments you fly the more fees/taxes you will pay. Aeroplan does not collect surcharges on non-Air Canada-operated flights. So flying Air Canada internationally will cost you extra. If you use a lot of Air Canada flights in your mini-RTW, your fees could be anywhere from $150 to $400, even sometimes creeping up above $600. Lesson is to avoid AC "metal" (airplanes) if possible.

Every trip will have a $30 cost per person for booking on the phone, regardless of the itinerary.

What are the change fees if I want to change a leg or multiple legs of the trip later?
$90 for changes after original booking. If there is an involuntary change because of flight schedules changing, there is no fee charged. Note that when you make a change, the taxes/fees associated with fuel, etc. may change. They may decrease or increase depending on the previous flight and the new flight. This is independent of the $90 rebooking fee. The $90 is flat regardless of how many of the segments you change. It is not $90 per changed segment.

How do I plan this trip out? Even finding a simple award ticket can be difficult online, let alone one with 10 segments!
Good question. It is recommended that you use either the All-Nippon Airways (ANA) website (guide on how here), the KVS tool (costs money) or ExpertFlyer (costs money). I personally like to use KVS, but it is not newbie-friendly. It is $20 for 2 months for the "diamond" level service, and $75 for a year. Small price to pay for saving a lot of time, if you can handle the learning curve. ANA is a good free method of finding segments and many people have had plenty of success with it.

The trick is to do this one segment at a time. So first find NYC > LONDON for the date you want and make sure that the award class you are looking for is available (e.g. Economy low fare). Then do the next leg: LONDON > ROME. Repeat for every segment. Write down the details of each flight, calculate the mileage using the www.gcmap.com resource, and call up Aeroplan to book.

IN CONCLUSION...

And of course, you should take a look at the wealth of information already posted on this topic in this forum. Hopefully for the newer members of FlyerTalk interested in the mini-RTW, this was somewhat helpful. But for more info, see:

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/air-c...ineraries.html

If you see any errors in the information provided above, or feel that something important has been left out, please let me know in this thread by replying or sending a PM. I will make an update to make sure the original post is as accurate as possible. Thanks for reading and happy flying! ^